WAGONS TAKE BOOMERS BACK TO `WONDER YEARS`

To the thirty- and fortysomething generation that grew up with them, the classic American station wagon is but a glimmer of the wonder years, a byproduct that carried Baby Boomers out of the suburbs and into adulthood.

To teenagers, the family wagon was the perfect victim for their driving training-only to be quickly followed by grievous disdain. After all, a station wagon is most uncool. Witness the opening scenes of the movie ''Revenge of the Nerds.''

But then, station wagons have become so totally uncool, they`re cool. Carmakers even are trying to recast the wagon`s image; witness Honda selling its first Accord station wagons.

About 395,000 station wagons of all makes were sold last year, down 5 percent from 1989. In the 1970s, a million a year were sold.

Now, mini-vans are approaching that million-a-year mark, and the line is beginning to blur between hatchbacks and wagons.

The market share may have shrunk, but automakers know wagons have their die-hard devotees. ''If I have to carry something large, I don`t worry about it,'' says Robert I. Berg, an analyst for the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency in Washington and four-time wagon owner.

Most people trace the birth of the station wagon-so designated for the duty of ferrying visitors and their luggage to and from the train stations-to the famous Ford Woody, circa 1930s.

Actually, wagons came and went in various forms after World War I. But after the second World War, prosperity came to America, and station wagons suddenly came into their own.

''When they were sold for commercial use, the numbers were fairly small,'' says Fred Fox, an automotive historian. ''But once families started using them in the `50s for passenger vehicles, the numbers went way up.''

Soon, the automakers even put ''style'' into wagons. Witness the Chevrolet Nomad in the late `50s.

Suddenly, they were a fixture of suburbia, a symbol of middle-class affluence: big V-8 engines and lush interiors bound for Six Flags, Disney World and the Grand Canyon.

Gadgetry advanced. Ford made the tailgate on the Country Squire swing sideways and fold down. Studebaker made the back roof slide forward so you could haul trees home.

Chrysler Town & Country crested the two-ton mark in 1969 and used a 440-cubic-inch engine to hurdle its great bulk down highways with 70-m.p.h. speed limits.

The gasoline crises of 1973 and 1979 marked the stumbling and fall, respectively, of the giant wagons.

These days, mini-vans may have outpaced wagons as passenger cars. But there`s no doubt that a wagon still is the better bet in case of an accident. Wagons, with their thick doors and roof pillars, can take broadside impacts better than thin-sided vans. Their longer noses can absorb more of a head-on crash.

But it`s probably as much as for the memories as safety considerations that wagons live on. For example, ''tailgate party'' entered the lexicon through the station wagon.

It should be no surprise that the few companies still producing the big, traditional American station wagon are aiming at aging, financially secure Boomers.

Forget the Plymouth Fury. Now, it`s Caprice ($17,875) at one end, and at the other the Buick Roadmaster Estate Wagon ($21,445), the grand master of wide.

Fads may be fickle, but some wagon loyalists have been unwavering in their admiration of the great American boxcar.

Nothing looks better than an old station wagon sagging under the weight of its own skin and a big-block V-8. To a car crusher, that is.

At the salvage yard, the traditional American station wagon arrives like prime rib set before the insatiable glutton.

''When you take those across the scales, they`re worth some money,'' said salesman David Martin, who tallies the tonnage at Ace Auto Salvage. He added wistfully, ''These new ones-Cavaliers, Escorts-there`s just nothing there.''